Corruption
by StoryGirl.98
Summary: Wheatley finds himself able to communicate from space, from a radio. Once-ler's radio is acting strange, and soon he finds himself having a talk with somone who knows power madness just as well as he does. Oneshot. No ships in this, just friendship.


**A/N: ** I finally saw the Lorax yesterday, and I loved it! And for some reason, when the How Bad Can I Possibly Be? scene was on, it reminded me of Wheatley's corruption. Now that I think about it, Once-ler and Wheatley are very similar.

Anyways, this takes place after Portal 2, and around five years after Once-ler locked himself up. Enjoy!

StoryGirl.98

–

Once-ler sat alone in his room. Empty silence. Normally he liked silence, but it just seemed overbearing today. On this day it had been five years since the last truffula tree was cut, five years since the Lorax left, since his family abandoned him, since he locked himself up here.  
He didn't like too look out the window, but he forced himself to look out it. Once a beautiful valley filled with life was now a charred, smog filled wasteland. And it was his fault.

**–  
**

Wheatley drifted through space, and he was terrified. It had became deathly quiet after the Space Cores battery drained, and now all Wheatley had for companionship was the moon.  
He couldn't help but think over his time at Aperture. Life was supposed to be simple for him. Do what your told, don't to what your not told to do.  
But then he had the idea to escape, and then he met that lovely lady, and she had trusted him. But things had to go bad after he was plugged into the chassis. And things only went worse with the corruption.  
Clearing his head, Wheatley suddenly noticed something. Without the Space core chattering his ear off, his communication radio was clear. He could send a message to someone!  
Wheatley waited patiently until he got a strong signal, and placed the call.  
_Please let this work..._

_–  
_

A buzzing noise caught Once-ler off guard. Turning around, he saw the numbers on his old radio going crazy, and then the strangest thing happened. It spoke to him.  
"Um, hello, can anybody hear me? Hello," a voice called  
_I must be going crazy._  
The radio hadn't worked in years and he thought it was just his mind playing tricks on him. He remembered he had a microphone laying around somewhere. He searched through drawers and boxes as the voice continued to beg for a response. He found it and rushed back to the radio.  
"If your there stomp once. If your not there, then obviously no stomping, and if you don't wanna talk two stomps will do. Please? Someone?" the voice chattered on and on.  
Once-ler had just plugged the microphone in.  
"Hello?" he said softly, his voice weak from not using it often.  
"Oh, good! There's someone there! Hello! I'm Wheatley," the voice, now named Wheatley, said.  
"My name is Once-ler."  
"Strange name... Hey, I need to know something!"  
"What do you need?"  
"Uh, do you happen to know a lady named Chell? Shortish, gray eyes, very mute?" Wheatley's voice wasn't as happy as it was earlier, now it was filled with regret.  
"No, sorry. I've never met a Chell. "  
"This is horrible. I need to apologize! I just can't go on like this, she needs to know I'm sorry!"  
Once-ler took the radio and the mike and sat down back in his chair, setting the objects on the desk.  
"Look, Wheatley, calm down, okay?"  
"No. I cant. She needs to know I'm sorry, and she's never gonna!" Wheatley sounded as if he was sobbing now.  
"If you don't mind me asking, what did you do?"

–

Wheatley paused. He never thought someone would ask that. This Once-ler person seemed like a nice guy, but what if he told him what he did and then he didn't want to speak to him anymore? He'd be just left alone in quiet space if he couldn't reach another person

But then again, what if he didn't tell him, and then Once-ler got mad for not answering his question? He thought over what he should do for a few minutes.

"Hey, you still there?" Once-ler's voice came in.

"Uh... yeah. It's just that I'm not quite sure if I should tell you."  
"You don't have to if you don't want to."  
"Nah, I think I will tell you. It'll be good to get this off my chest."  
"Okay,"

"Well, there was this lady. Chell. And me and her had to work together for something, and right when everything was going to be all fine and dandy I turned on her. I didn't mean to, thought! I was put in a very powerful position, and it felt so good after being just tiny little Wheatley for my whole life, and I sorta became, what's the word,"  
"Corrupted?" Once-ler asked.

"Yes! That's it. And I just turned on her, abandoning her friendship and everything. And I tried to do some horrible stuff which I thought was good but turned out to be horrible... and I lost it all. And now I'm alone here, and I can't find her, and I'll probably never get to apologize. So, yeah. That's pretty much it."  
"Wow..."  
"I don't blame you if you think I'm a monster, I-"  
"Monster? Nope. In fact, you're probably a better person than me. The funny part is that my story is similar to yours," Once-ler said.

"What did you do?"  
Wheatley heard Once-ler take a deep breath.

–

Once-ler momentarily panicked. Why did he bring up his past? He didn't really know where to start, and how to tell it without him seeming like a heartless jerk. He took another deep breath. Wheatley had been nice enough to tell him his problem, now he was going to tell him his.  
"Well, a few years ago I left home, planning on making and selling this invention I have, the thneed. I needed the right stuff to make it though, and I couldn't find it anywhere. But then I found this beautiful valley, it was perfect, and the trees had the perfect stuff for the thneeds. And even though I promised not to chop down any trees, I sorta did. And I sold my thneeds, and one thing lead to another, and I got greedier and greedier and now all of the truffula trees are gone. And the air is smog filled and the water is gunk, and my family and friends abandoned me. And I don't know how to fix any of it."

Once-ler spoke in a rush, slightly glad to get this out of his head. Telling it out loud to someone made him feel a little better.

"I suppose we are a little similar," Wheatley said.

–

Once-ler and Wheatley continued to talk for hours, about any little thing. Wheatley was glad that he finally found someone to have a decent conversation with, and Once-ler was just happy he had a friend now. Once-ler was just a bit surprised at finding out that Wheatley was a robot, and Wheatley was thoroughly confused at Once-ler's description of a thneed.

But the topic they discussed most was corruption. It was the thing they had the most in common. Even though they both hated that point in their lives, they liked to discuss it with someone who would understand. It felt nice.

–

A little light flashed in the corner of Wheatley's vision, alerting him that the radio signal was getting weaker.

"I hate to say this, but I gotta go. My radio signal is getting weak," He told Once-ler.

"Oh, okay. Maybe we can talk again sometime?"  
"Sure."  
Once-ler was about to reply, when the link was cut off. He leaned back in his chair and smiled. He might never hear from Wheatley again, but he finally had a friend.

–

**A/N:** Yeah, I made Wheatley and Once-ler best friends. They just are too similar to not be friends!

Reviews are appreciated!

-StoryGirl.98


End file.
